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PC Preview - 'Rift: Storm Legion'

Rift: Storm Legion is the first expansion and features an increased level cap, two new continents, additional souls, and a new storyline that mesmerizes and challenges even the most seasoned Rift players.

After releasing nine huge content patches in a little over a year, Rift's continent of Mathosia is so full to bursting that there's really nowhere to put anything else. The solution, clearly, is to add a couple of new ones. Enter Storm Legion, Rift's first true expansion pack. Storm Legion comes with all the trimmings one expects from an MMO expansion: 10 new levels to raise the level cap to 60, four new souls (one for each class), and several new dungeons and raids, all across two huge new continents, each half the size of Mathosia.

However, that's not all. They'll also be adding a new armor slot for capes, making everyone just that much more stylish. Also on the docket are dimensions, which are player and guild housing "with a twist." Trion is reluctant to share much more about that, perhaps planning to reveal more over the course of the year, but just knowing that housing is in the cards for us is enough for now.

The world appears to have been turned up to 11. Beautiful, sweeping landscapes and sprawling technomagic dungeons are just the tip of the iceberg. Everything has a much more epic, larger-than-life feel. The enemies are bigger, with monsters the size of cities destroying battalions with the sweep of its tail. Combat is more action-oriented and faster paced, giving players more choices in world events than just click-monster-cast-spell. You can man catapults or hit a launch platform to soar into the air at a giant's weak spot. Knock chunks of armor off a monster to make it easier for you and your fellows to defeat. Pick up power-ups during a battle to heal, increase your speed, or deal more damage.

Trion Worlds, of course, intends to continue its pattern of regular content patches, both before and after Storm Legion's release. The game is constantly evolving and growing in response to player input, adding more raids and PvP in addition to new gameplay mechanics, like mentoring. They feel that games are a service and that it's their job to make us want to keep playing, and to always give us more to play.

It's still too early to know what to expect from Rift: Storm Legion, but it's clearly going to be bigger and badder than any of the content patches we've seen so far. Fans of Rift should keep an eye out for Storm Legion close to the end of this year.